S’Estaca, fishing village between Valldemossa and DeiàThe hero of The Clash’s bassist’s new exhibition, Paul Simonan example of a picture, under the heading Two Years in London and MallorcaIt can be visited nowadays at the John Martin Gallery in London.
Paul Simonon, who spends long periods in Deià for yearsFrom the start of his first incarceration of 2020, and for the next two years, he decided to date the surroundings of London, where he lived, and Mallorca, where he simply could not find a place. for rest, also for inspiration. In his studio in Paddington, the capital of England, he worked on a series of paintings, mostly done at night and illuminated by streetlights.It reflects the loneliness and deep serenity he found in those first months of isolation. Referring to London in the spring of 2020, Simonon explains that “evening streetlights will illuminate the narrow houses, transform into a theater set and, in a way, seem to have gone back in time.” in works such as Line anyone Vermeer’s Daughter.
In the summer of that year, Simon has moved Majorca to focus entirely on your painting and live in isolation. He settled himself in a room in s’Estaca and set to work with the supplies and supplies he had brought from London. They say they spent more than twelve months in total painting, painting “with no shops or bars around and with a self-proclaimed fisherman,” from the John Martin Gallery. Simonon recalls this daily routine and says: “Somehow, wherever you are, you discover a lot in your mind when you’re alone.“.
Simonon had a tough time at the beginning. “It was such a beautiful place, s’Estaca, that I couldn’t see anything I really wanted to paint.All that changed when, walking along the rugged beach one afternoon, he noticed the Moon rising and began painting the nightscape, unwittingly finding a continuity with his Paddington Street paintings. days, until late most nights.
“I was lost in time and it was like being on the other side of the world… the weather was constantly changing and I saw rain clouds rising. The waves crashed under the houses and you felt alive,” he admits of those days and long nights in s’Estaca.
The exhibition, which opened on 21 and will remain open until 6 October, is fueled not only by paintings, but also by a series of carved figures made from driftwood and trunks found on the shores of Mallorca’s north coast.
painter before musician
Known all over the world for his membership in The Clash, one of the most influential and iconic bands of the last 40 years, Paul Simonon, a capital group in the history of punk, The Clash, was a painter before he became a musician. Born and raised in Brixton, one of South London’s poorest areas, mostly Jamaican immigrants, plastic art was one of his first passions. As the son of a painter affiliated with the local communist party, he earned a scholarship to the prestigious Byam Shaw School of Art in Kensington.Today it is part of the College of Art and Design at Central Saint Martin, where artists such as Winifred Nicholson and Bernard Dunstan or actor John Standing once studied. Meanwhile, Simonon met Mick Jones, who asked him if he wanted to start a rock band. Simonon, who had not played the bass until that time and sang, first played an important role in the visual identity of The Clash to audition as the vocalist of the London SS group, a test he failed to pass, and then, after many trials, he started hanging the bass, the instrument he would always identify with. Soon they would be joined by Joe Strummer and the journey of a band like no other would begin, without which it would be impossible to explain the history of punk, The Clash, which was featured as a major influence in the 2013 exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. art in New York Chaos for Couture.
“Simonon has always been passionate. Art Since the band’s breakup in the mid-1980s, painting has become as important as his music career.. His passion for painting began as a child, his father was an avid hobby painter who used his son’s bedroom as his workshop. Surrounded by books and pictures nailed to the walls, it was there that he first encountered the art world”, notes those in charge of the London gallery.
The first of the exhibitions Simonon worked on dates back to 1996 and was in a collective exhibition at exactly the same gallery, John Martin. Then others would come, Show in the colony room, in London, 1998; individual Hammersmith to Greenwich, again in the British capital in 2002; anyone newPresented at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh, a selection of works by British artists since 1990 acquired by the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art.
Two of the last examples latest picturesa series of oil paintings inspired by a bullfight at the Thomas Williams Fine Arts Center in London in 2008, which he witnessed during his visit to Las Ventas in May 2003, in which matador Antonio Barrera was injured; Y What! No bikes?Exhibiting both in 2015 self portraits What still naturepictures showing their personal effects: jackets, boots, helmets and gloves, as well as biker paraphernalia consisting of cigarette packs and books.
Cover of an album by him, also by former member of The Clash Mick Jones., Big Sound Dynamiteand album The Good, the Bad and the Queenthey played with Simonon and Damon Albarn as well as former The Verve guitarist Simon Tong; and African ’70s drummer and Afrobeat pioneer Tony Allen.
Simonon is also known for choosing the name for The Clash. “collision”In Spanish, the name was apparently suggested by the bassist after a car accident that occurred while he was considering a few names for the band.
tramp icon – image of her album cover London is calling In this photograph, one of the most representative photographs in rock history, he has a house in Deià for years and is a regular customer of the bar, depicted by Pennie Smith breaking the press. through which countless stars pass.
Last year, he moved from Deià to Fundació Miró at the end of May. an exhibition project under the arm and is interested in learning the music of Pullman, the group formed by Miró’s granddaughter Joan Punyet.